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Privacy Policy

COMMITMENT TO YOUR PRIVACY

This website is owned and operated by Oceana, Inc. on behalf of Oceana, Inc. and its world-wide affiliates (collectively “Oceana”). We understand that you value your privacy. This policy governs information you provide to us or that we learn from your use of this website and other contacts with Oceana. It explains how we may collect, use, and in some instances share this information.

Personal Information Defined

Oceana considers “Personal Information” to include information that alone or when in combination with other information may be used to readily identify, contact, or locate you, such as: name, address, email address, or phone number. Oceana does not consider Personal Information to include information that has been anonymized so that it does not allow a third party to easily identify a specific individual.

INFORMATION OCEANA COLLECTS AND HOW WE USE IT

Information You Provide

We may ask you to provide us with Personal Information if you would like to participate in some activities available on, or benefit from services offered on, this website. Through the use of forms we may collect this information to help provide you with Oceana services and respond to your requests.

If you choose to make a donation or other activity that requires payment, we may also ask for information required for billing and shipment, such as your credit card number, card verification value code, billing address, phone number, and email address. Oceana will not share or sell a donor's personal information with anyone else, nor send donor mailings on behalf of other organizations; and Oceana will only share or sell personal information once the donor has given the charity specific permission to do so. This policy is applicable to both online and offline donors.

If you would like to post comments to our blog, you may log in with your log-in credentials from other websites, including Facebook, Twitter, Google, or Yahoo!. When you log in this way, we may collect Personal Information from such websites. For example, when you log in with your Facebook credentials, we may collect the Personal Information you have made publicly available in Facebook, such as your name and profile picture. We may also obtain other information with your permission, such as your email address. The information we obtain may depend on your privacy settings with the other website.

We may collect Personal Information through your communications with our supporter relations and donor relations teams.

We try to limit our requests for Personal Information to information we believe is minimally necessary to achieve our stated collection purposes.

Usage Tracking

We track website usage data to improve our website. We collect user traffic patterns throughout our website using web logs, cookies, and similar technologies. This information is collected to help improve website flow and usability. In addition, when we send emails to our members and supporters, we track information on clicks-through to our website, including IP addresses. This is done to gauge the effectiveness of our marketing campaigns and to discourage fraudulent use.

Cookies

We may place a text file called a “cookie” in the browser files of your computer. . A cookie cannot read data off your hard disk or read cookie files created by other websites. Oceana may use cookies to track user traffic patterns (as described above). In addition, Oceana uses encrypted cookies to authenticate the user on each page after the user logs onto the website. You can refuse cookies by turning them off in your browser. If you have set your browser to warn you before accepting cookies, you will receive the warning message with each cookie. Some Oceana website features and services may not function properly if your cookies are disabled.

Our Usage of Personal Information

We process Personal Information as described above and also for such internal and service-related purposes as:

To advance our mission including delivering information that may be of interest to our supporters;

To conduct research and analysis in order to maintain and improve our website and advance our mission;

To alert you to news updates and related developments, special offers, and other new Oceana offerings. We provide you with controls so that you can determine whether or not you would like to continue to receive such communications if you so choose (as described below);

To contact you in response to requests for information such as requests made through the “Contact Us” page of our web site.

We only retain personal information for as long as necessary to fulfill the above purposes or as permitted or required by applicable law.

Children

Oceana does not knowingly collect, maintain, or use any Personal Information from children under 13 years of age. If we become aware that we have collected any Personal Information from children under 13, we will promptly delete such information from our databases. If you are a parent or guardian and discover that your child under the age of 13 has used the website, then you may alert us at wavemaker@oceana.org and request that we delete that child’s Personal Information from our systems.

User Access

We make a good faith effort to provide you with access to your Personal Information to correct data that may be inaccurate or delete data at your request. If you would like to review the information in our files, correct it, or ask Oceana to refrain from sending you information in the future, please contact us by e-mail at info@oceana.org, by calling Oceana’s membership department at +1.202.833.3900, or by writing to the postal address listed below. We may decline to process requests in limited circumstances, including where the request is excessive, may jeopardize the privacy of others,or where information is required to be retained by law or for legitimate business purposes.

OCEANA TRANSFER AND INFORMATION SHARING POLICY

We do not rent, sell, or share Personal Information collected on this website with third parties for their direct marketing purposes without your permission. We may provide Personal Information to or permit access to Personal Information by vendors and service providers who are contracted to help us administer this website. These service providers may process Personal Information on our behalf or use Personal Information to assist Oceana in administering our website. Oceana does not otherwise share Personal Information about website users with third parties unless doing so is appropriate to carry out a user’s request or Oceana reasonably believes that doing so is legally required or is in Oceana’s interest to protect its property or other legal rights or the rights or property of others.

Reorganization of Oceana

If Oceana should ever file for bankruptcy or have its assets sold to or merged with another entity, information Oceana receives from you shall be treated as an Oceana asset and may be transferred as part of any such transactions.

Affiliated Websites, Other Websites, and Advertisements

This Privacy Policy applies to websites and services that are owned and operated by Oceana. We do not exercise control over the websites of third parties that you may link to or view as part of a frame on a page on this website. These other sites may place their own cookies or other files on your computer, collect data, or solicit Personal Information from you. We are not responsible for the actions or policies of such third parties. You should check the applicable privacy policies of those third parties when providing information on a feature or page operated by a third party.

INTERNATIONAL VISITORS AND CUSTOMERS

This website is hosted in the United States. If you are visiting from the European Union or other regions with laws governing data collection and use that may differ from U.S. law please note that you are transferring your personal data to the United States, where a statutory level of data protection applies that is not comparable to the level of data protection within the EEA. Whenever such transfer occurs, it is based on the standard contractual clauses (according to EU Commission Decision 87/2010/EC or any future replacement) in order to contractually provide that your Personal Data is subject to a level of data protection that applies within the EEA. You may obtain a redacted copy (from which commercial information and information that is not relevant has been removed) of such standard contractual clauses by sending a request to info@oceana.org or the postal address listed below.

SECURITY

We take steps to ensure that your information is treated securely and in accordance with this Privacy Policy, including encrypting data, using secure HTTPS protocol for transmission and ensuring that all access to data by Oceana staff is limited. No data transmissions over the Internet can be guaranteed to be completely secure. Consequently, we cannot ensure or warrant that information you transmit to us will never be accessed. If Oceana learns of a security systems breach we may need to notify you electronically so that you can take appropriate protective steps. By using this website or providing Personal Information to us you agree that we can communicate with you electronically regarding security, privacy and administrative issues relating to your use of this website. Oceana may post a notice on our website if a security breach occurs. Oceana may also need to send an email to you at the email address you have provided to us in these circumstances. Depending on where you live, you may have a legal right to receive notice of a security breach in writing. To receive free written notice of a security breach (or to withdraw your consent from receiving electronic notice) you should notify us at info@oceana.org.

CHANGES AND UPDATES

We may occasionally update this Privacy Policy. When we do, we will also revise the “effective date” on the Privacy Policy. For changes to this Privacy Policy that may be materially less restrictive on our use or disclosure of Personal Information you have provided to us, we will attempt to obtain your consent before implementing the change. We encourage you to periodically review this Privacy Policy to stay informed about how we are protecting the Personal Information we collect. Your continued use of this website constitutes your agreement to this Privacy Policy and any updates.

CONTACTING OCEANA

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns about Oceana or this Privacy Policy, please email us at info@oceana.org. In the event that we are still unable to resolve your concerns Oceana is committed to cooperating to achieve a proper resolution of your privacy concerns.